Ramblings concerning things that really do not matter

Do No Harm

January 26, 2010

Another Jack centric. And already, the “I need to save/fix” character flaw is starting to overstay its welcome.

Island mythology: 0.5 out of 10. Jin hears whispers. That’s about it.

Philosophical concepts/ongoing themes: 2.5 out of 10. The issue of ethics is explored when Jack confronts his need to fix Boone (helped decently by the flashback), but nothing really deep is explored here.

Character development: 6.25 out of 10. Jack’s wife Sarah is introduced here, and Jack does show some growth in heeding Boone’s wishes not to amputate (I liked the callback to Jack and Rose’s conversation). But as I mentioned above, this character flaw of Jack’s continues to be rehashed, and is already becoming tiresome. Then again, I’d take ten more of these over another Jack’s tattoo flashback. One thing worth pointing out is that already, before they are even married, there is a major indication that it will not work out. When Jack tells Sarah at the altar that he has problems letting go (which parallels with his letting go of Boone on-island), the implication is that he only married her due to this other character flaw, and that down the line, this will turn into obsessiveness. Jack has already been portrayed as acting on emotion fairly regularly, and tying in with this is an obsessiveness, a putting on of blinders and a failing to “see the big picture,” as Sawyer puts it.

Funny how both the last episode with Locke and this one with Jack portray a very similar obsessiveness. Even though philosophically, both are on opposite ends of the spectrum, they are actually very much alike. This may be the reason they continually butt heads. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were both Tauruses, actually (to take a page out of Claire’s book).

Importance of episode to series: 6.75 out of 10. Granted, Boone dies, and Aaron is born, but as for the impact of both events on the grand scheme of things, neither has a major impact (so far). As Shannon does not live too much longer anyway, Boone’s death is not that impactful. As for Aaron, his birth does influence future events and characters (Kate, Charlie, Juliet to an extent, and Claire herself, obviously) but as far as has been shown so far, Aaron only affects minor plotlines that impact characters’ lives, not the outcome of endgame. And I’ll grant that Aaron has been hinted at and theorized to have a major impact on endgame, but as it’s not been shown yet, this episode is merely competent here.

Personal enjoyment of episode: 7 out of 10. As many negative things as I’ve written above, this episode is nowhere near bad. It’s a competent “crisis of the week” episode, and is done much better than the earlier ones this season. Although the flashback turned me off a bit, Jack’s “vows” were handled well, and this was another great use of the Life and Death theme. Possibly the best of the series…disregard what I had posted earlier about Jack in the caves. The poignancy and appropriateness of the theme are what caused me to give this episode the benefit of the doubt. Both times the theme has been used so far, I teared up, so for this category, I’m inflating the score a bit.